Your Favorite Beers/Styles Replaced By NEIPA and Pastry Stout?

Ivan the Terrible? Barrel Aged. But I hear it's a mess now. Great back in the day.

 

I was referencing the pastry stout craze, there is some BA Ivan sitting at the bottle shop right now but it's overpriced, still like the regular version more. Überbrew has a couple BA stouts on tap but it's across town and I work nights, Some day the things I trade for, order online and stock up on during vacations will hopefully make it to our shelves.

 

We still have a very healthy variety of good to great beers from a growing number of local brewers. The NEIPA and Pastry Stouts exist, but are not supplanting any other flavors-read IPA. I don't see the apparent faddishness locally that I read of nationally. My favorite local beer is Gibb's 100 Blind Man's Holiday (Greensboro Pale Ale). It is a bit hazy, but nicely bitter with a fine malt backbone. It is more English in style and utterly delicious.

 

While NEIPAs and dessert-flavored stouts have definitely begun to establish a foothold here in Portland (though, to be fair, dessert-flavored stouts have been here for some time), I still don't find it hard to acquire excellent West Coast IPAs, dry stouts, and lagers. The current trend here seems to be a decline in shelf/tap space for the older breweries that were once dominant (like Widmer, Bridgeport, and even Cascade) in favor of breweries that are either trendy and new (Great Notion, Little Beast) or play around a lot more (Breakside, Culmination). In the end, though, I don't mind too much. So long as breweries can keep their quality up while staying trendy, like Breakside, the future looks bright. And so long as selling trendy beer allows breweries to play with older and less popular styles, I'll continue to be happy.

 

Now there is a style that has been pretty clearly marginalized. Ipswich Brewery here in MA still makes a delicious English (esque) IPA as well, but I can't remember ever seeing a thread here decrying the diminishing options in that style. Did this bother people back when West Coast IPAs took over?

 

I have a really hard time finding any good barleywines anymore. Troegs stopped distributing Flying Mouflan, Old Guardian is no more, haven't seen Old Horizontal in forever, and Bigfoot isn't even as available as it used to be. I don't want the style all the time, but when I do it's a challenge.

 

Not at all, around here I can find any style any time of the day both on premise and store wise. This has been the case for years. Sure there are some super hipster breweries opening up with the sole purpose of making the neckbeard styles peddled through the brew pub, but they aren't replacing anything because there are so many other local breweries and beers focusing on different planes.

Package wise: Last night I had a Victory Hop Devil, tonight I had NB's voodoo juicy haze. Two nights ago I had a Commonwealth Wapatoolie. All IPA's of different styles/genre's, plenty to choose from around here, no pressure. Vote with your dollar. As long as you find beer you like, continue to support it.

 

There has never been a better time for beer. Beers of all styles are much more available than they were 5 years ago.

One trend I'm seeing in the comments is that "I can't find X beer anymore." There's no shortage of styles, but I think brewers are trying to get as many new beer names out there at the expense of leaving behind some old favorites. This is a result of the Ticker/Untappd mentality IMO. Not necessarily a problem to me, but I could understand if your favorite beer is only release

 

I love Ipswich Beers. I sold them and business traction was tough, with Green Flash, Lagunitas, and Ballast Point coming on board at about the same time. But that was then. Everyone of the Ipswich line-up was very good. I liked the regular ale and oatmeal stout best, and as good as the beers were, I never was able to market them well. This is a big regret and I always thought these quality brews filled a unique niche. Packaging was often mentioned. I happened to like the package. You just never know. Things were moving west....

 

Just had long trail ale in December , I paid $23.99 a case and was quite happy with this beer. The blaze I tried was good as well and I really enjoyed the flyin IPA.

I am not the typical BA beer drinker/buyer but I stop at places that sell beer to look for something(never seem to find it). I see many 16oz canned IPA(no dates in them and above $14) and other beers. I see very few brown ales, regular stout, Porter? Tough to find a good one w/o flavors.

Lager is pretty easy to find here. Overall variety is big but a closer look is a tightening of styles and a broadening of breweries available. What was a fast mover now sits in favor of the next big thing.

Enjoy

 

I'm significantly less concerned with non-adjunct non-BA stouts being run out of town by pastry stouts or WC IPAS being run out of town by the haze craze then I am about non-mixed fermentation saisons becoming harder and harder to find. I love a Brett saison as much as the next guy, but sometimes you just want a simple farmhouse ale.

 

We don’t get a ton of NEIPAs here in my part of SC, some weak attempts that sell out quickly at $16/4-pack. I personally love that style when done properly. I’m kinda over the mad variations on stouts

 

No problem finding basic styles here, in regional/national/import distribution or local taprooms. I have not seen NEIPAs here. I have no issue with pastry stouts - I like some of them, and would like to try a NEIPA even though I'm not into IPAs. Demand defines the market, and if there are folks into craft just for the pastry stouts and NEIPAs, welcome aboard!

 

Depends on where you're looking. Of course the specialty stores will have a massive (if aging and typically warm-stored) variety of styles. But for tap walls and grocery/c-store shelves, yes, lots of my favorites have long since disappeared and been replaced now by hazy IPAs and pastry stouts.

 

It'll change again soon enough.

 

I don't think "pastry stouts" are taking away the availability of the more traditional styles, however they seem to be creating a type of niche, similar to what NEIPAs did. I find you have more people saying they drink dark beer/stouts, when it's really these type of stouts.

 

If it's not hard to get many people seem to just flat out ignore it. Plenty of everything in my area. Bigger problem is there is never enough time, money or liver to drink it all

 

Maybe it's just my area, but I would say that English IPA's out-number NE IPA's. There is one local brewery that makes a ton of excellent, juicy NE IPA's but the rest are definitely not following suit. As for "pastry" stouts, I don't think I've ever had one myself or seen a locally brewed one, but I do see them in the stores.

At least to me, there's something a little off-putting about a Maple Blueberry Pancake Stout (one that I saw on the shelf).

 

I’m not convinced this is a major problem personally. Obviously NEIPAs and flavoured stouts are hawt right now, and therefore more likely to be discussed on here, and appear on social media etc. And for people that don’t like those styles or don’t want to only drink those styles, that can be mildly frustrating and it’s probably easy to equate the fact it’s in their faces with a lack of availability of other styles. But (and I’ll caveat this by saying I don’t go to tons of different stores) at the stores I go to, there may be a downward trend in terms of imports which is unfortunate, but in terms of varied styles from US breweries I think there’s plenty out there. And although I constantly rant about the need to appreciate varied styles, and how I would love some of the low ABV / cask UK styles to catch on, there are some legacy American craft styles that frankly (for my tastes) I’m not going to miss that much if they truly are cropping up less - Amber/Red ale comes to mind.

The two areas where it probably does show a little are bars/breweries

Bars - a handful in NYC that cater to the BA type crowd have probably got a bit heavy on the aforementioned styles. But then again there are others that I feel have made a point of keeping things as varied as possible despite what’s trending. So no major problem there.

Breweries - would love the likes of OH to mix things up a bit. But whatever, it’s their business and I can understand if they want to focus on what a) sells and b) they have a reputation for. And for every OH, there’s a place like Suarez who have a wider/different/less-influenced type of focus

 

Thanks for sharing. I didn't know you were/are in the distribution business. That's funny about the labels since they've never struck me as remotely controversial, but now that you mention it I can see how their appeal might be very region specific.

As you say, their oatmeal stout is absolutely fantastic, and as much as I'm generally someone who thinks my available options are the best they've ever been, there are definitely not many other plain oatmeal stouts on the shelf. Though I don't know for sure if there ever were - my memory of the 90s is that it was mostly just them and Samuel Smith.

They also make a great West Coast IPA that has been a staple around here for years (Route 101) and recently released an NE IPA (1620) which is decent but not great. They have to be on a very short list of breweries who are making and distributing all three takes on an IPA!

ETA: this is their new barley wine (which is very tasty) and you can see that the label is a bit of a departure for them. Maybe they will be moving to modernize/funkerize things with the increasingly crowded shelves?

 

Thanks for that thoughtful post. The packaging does seem to have changed. I always loved the nautical theme of their labels, and that should have resonated here in North Carolina, but who knows? The definitive oat meal stout (for me) was always Young's. I can still taste it from memory! I miss that beer..

 

I would agree that there's a big difference when you look in the stores and when you look in the taprooms and beer bars. Beer stores/distributors tend to target the market as a whole, while taprooms and beer bars are targeting the beer geek. Never been to a taproom or beer bar around here that didn't have at least a couple NEIPAs on draught and most of them have some type of BBA or imperial pastry stout on as well. The stores, unless they are specialty stores, rarely have either, as a lot of the NEIPAs are being sold at straight from the brewery "releases" and the BBA and pastry stouts tend to be special bottled releases.

 

Dave, I think you summarized today's craft beer market pretty well here.

It will be interesting to see what changes occur next year and/or the year after.

Cheers!

 

This may be anecdotal, and I've been known to have my thumb up my ass rather than my finger on the pulse, but at least in Colorado these styles are certainly present, but not ubiquitous. Yes, there are taprooms here who seem to have the hazy ipa and pastry stout game on lock down (@CerebralBrewing ), but there are far more places who just keep doing what they do best. Bierstadt certainly isn't jumping on the bandwagon, neither is @dauss over at Comrade. It seems that these styles, while possibly pushing other styles off shelves and taps in other locations, have been embraced by beer culture in Colorado. I feel that while some beer scenes are pushing for exclusivity with their beers, MA I'm looking you're way, Colorado has a very inclusive scene here where newcomers, both brewer and beer style, are welcomed. Isn't that really what we want? More good beer?

 

Yup, but each beer consumer will give you a differing answer on what constitutes what "good" means.

Watch the reaction in a BA thread if some person posts that what is needed is more AAL beers.

Cheers!

 

Their oatmeal stout is a classic, but unfortunately it's one of many stouts and porters that have disappeared over the past few years around here.

 

I think it would have almost made as much sense to just start a thread titled “what are your favorite beer styles”, although I guess that’s been done a thousand times already. The answer to the question I think you are trying to ask is probably “regular IPAs and stouts”. As others have mentioned some of us would be happy if these newer styles started poping up on our shelves, but then again most of us aren’t in New York and Vermont which is years ahead of everywhere else beer wise. Still not the worst problem in the world, just means you’ll be the first to have whatever new beer trend is on the horizon.

 

I've made this point on other threads, but I do believe that the primary (though not sole) appeal of both NEIPAs and pastry stouts is to newer craft beer drinkers who crave sweet, familiar flavors but also seek the cachet that IPAs and imperial stouts long have had in craft beer. They are extraordinarily accessible versions of historically challenging and polarizing styles. Consequently, NEIPAs and pastry stouts haven't taken all that much of a hold in mature markets like Colorado, where craft beer customers on average are more experienced and tend not to require sweet, accessible flavors to enjoy their beer. Rather, they tend to be extraordinarily popular in burgeoning markets that have seen massive growth in recent years from a relatively small base (i.e., where there is a large proportion of new craft beer consumers whose palates are still developing). Most of the markets in which these beers are particularly popular aren't "years ahead of everywhere else beer wise." That may be true compared to the likes of South Dakota, but they're years, even decades, behind the likes of Colorado.

 

Laughing, I wipe the froth from my well-aged Rogue Voodoo Doughnut Chocolate Banana and Peanut Ale, I have to agree. I lied. It's really snowing here and I just had a Gibb's 100 Blind Man's Holiday (Greensboro Pale Ale) and I really like your post!

 

Way down south. Marion. Sure, we get other styles, and my local store is getting better recently I think, but the vast majority of beers are hoppy pale/ipa/stout or crap lager. The major Belgians are usually available and a couple good Germans, but other American craft styles are hard to come by because breweries simply aren't making that many. I go to St. Louis often and it's not all that different than here.

 

In the smaller stores here in Connecticut mostly all classic styles have disapeared from the shelves. The store closest to my house use to have at least 3 German lagers around. Hofbrau, Paulaner, Spaten, etc. The last few times I visited they had nothing. And good luck finding a brown ale around here that isn't Brown Note.
Not only have they taken over the shelves but breweries as well. Relic, which was and is a great lager brewery, has become quite popular now that they have started brewing IPAs and bigger stouts. Before that most folks wouldn't know who they were so I can't blame them. (If you ever see an Origin of Species Bock I suggest you guys pick one up.) Kent Falls is going in that direction with there cans as well. I am sure anyone who has visited Singlecut a few years ago verses today will notice the change there as well. There is a reason I don't use my Singlecut Pilsner glasses anymore. I got nuthin' to put in 'em.
This isn't really a complaint, rather an observation. Although, I do miss having a choice in the smaller stores with German and Belgian classics and the American made classic styles I can always go to Total Wine, which is what I usually do now anyway.

 

Since you basically quoted my post, I might as well clarify that I was only referring to the northeast having been years ahead of everywhere else for the NE style, although I’d agree most places have caught up.

Think you forgot to tip your fedora

 

You keep making this point and it frankly strikes me as a bit bizarre. Writing off Sam Adams Boston Lager and Harpoon IPA as some sort historic footnotes to the beer culture here is your prerogative I suppose, but given that there were about 300 craft breweries in the entire country in 1990 I'm not sure where you think you're finding these throngs of people with "more developed" palates decades in the making everywhere but Massachusetts.

If you wanted to say that MA was hitting under its weight class for a while given that strong start you'd perhaps have a point, but a far more obvious answer to why NE IPAs are popular in New England is because, well, I'm guessing the name can help you do the math.

 

In the Maryland/Mid-Atlantic area we have a good variety of styles done well. The only thing I wish I could see more is Belgian style ales. Luckily Weyerbacher is not far and makes terrific Belgian style ales but outside of them, there isn't much in this area

 

I don't generally do the trading thing but if you ever get a hankering drop me a note and I'll set you up

Do you guys get Otter Creek? Their Couchsurfer Oatmeal Stout is pretty good if you haven't tried it.

 

It's certainly a "problem" that has come about with the craft beer explosion in the US. Less demand for great imports. I think that if I had to choose between imports and what we have now, though, I'd go with what we have now. Greater availability of very fresh beer trumps great classic styles that are probably less than fresh. I hate that it does, but it does. Now to get some more people here stateside making more of those classic styles and making them well.

 

I would posit that Ipswich, Haw River Farmhouse Ales, Olde Mecklenburg, Red Oak, Von Trappe, Foothills, Gibb's 100 and many, many more are doing just that.